NEW MIS/TOS: Reversion (1/1) G (Kahless, Q) Title: Reversion Author: Dave Rogers Email Address: daverogers@geocities.com Series: MIS/TOS Rating: PG Codes: Kahless, Q Part: 1/1 Date Posted: Summary: The answer to The Big Question from "Trials and Tribble-ations". After the events of "The Savage Curtain", a brief conversation shapes the future of an empire. Disclaimer: Klingons belong to Paramount, whatever I do with their foreheads. Acknowledgements: Thanks to Jenn for beta reading, and to Eric's Excruciatingly Detailed Star Trek (TOS) Plot Summaries website for background information. Reversion In a place that was not a place, but more the essence of a place, two figures stood watching. Around them were mere suggestions of walls, ceiling and floor, and before them the ghostly suggestion of a banqueting table was laden to groaning point with food, much of it trying to escape. Gagh has always been an acquired taste. The table before them was both there and not there. If they chose it not to be, they could see fates laid out before them - not people, or people's lives, but the patterns that shaped people's lives. Both could understand them; one because, long since dead, he was more god than mortal, and the other because he found it amusing to understand. The dead one spoke first, in a voice that, despite its severity, had behind every word the echo of booming laughter. "You saw, when you were not too busy polishing your silicates. They accepted me as the embodiment of evil, the human and the Vulcan halfbreed, without question. You stood me beside Khan, Green and Zora, and they thought I belonged there." There was anger in the last few words, but a resigned anger. "Half a century, and this is all you have achieved." The second figure had a very different voice; pedantic, sarcastic, precise and effeminate, suffused with perpetual disappointment that no-one else seemed to be able to get the joke. "Can I help it if they're not that intelligent?" Kahless the Unforgettable turned to face his companion. "Your little charade on Excalbia was supposed to be a test, was it not? How many ways must I tell you that your little experiment has failed?" "I'd rather you didn't tell me at all," replied Q. "I find failure so depressing. I'm just not accustomed to it like you mortals." "Ha!" The laugh, short as it was, seemed to reveal more of the true nature of Kahless than any angry words. "The great, omnipotent Q brought low by the Klingon empire? I like that thought." Kahless had no corporeal arm to slap Q on the back, but the intensity of his thoughts alone left the omnipotent being stumbling slightly. "Brought low by the inability of the Klingon people to realise their potential," replied Q. "I had such hopes of you! That's why I did this to you, to try and make you more like these humans. Now they, they have real potential. And yet all you seem to be able to do is fight them." "What did you expect? Every living Klingon, and the spirit of every honourable warrior, waking up one morning to find ourselves like this?" Even a disembodied Klingon spirit had a forehead, and Kahless raised a hand to his in illustration of his words, feeling its human smoothness with disgust. "And then, to be approached by these humans, and find ourselves looking like them. Who else were we supposed to blame?" "We? I like that. All you've done is look down from on high and criticise." "It saddens me." Kahless seemed to ignore Q's sarcasm. "My people have lost their way. I taught them that the will to fight follows on from the joy within the Klingon heart. Now they fight to try to find that joy. Before long, they will be fighting to hide the lack of it. The Empire is ruled by," he spat the word out, "politicians, not warriors. We are too like the humans." "If only," muttered Q, turning his head away. Kahless's anger flared again. "You and your precious humans! If you like them so much, why not mate with one?" "The right one hasn't been born yet," mused Q sadly. "Though there will be a starship Captain..." "Spare me the details." Suddenly Q's resolve seemed to snap. "All right, all right, the whole thing's a failure. So what do you want me to do about it?" "We must return to the ways of the warrior," pronounced Kahless in a tone of finality. "Oh, yes, of course, you and your warrior macho." Q's voice was taunting, mocking again. "I suppose you want those silly foreheads back too?" "It would be a start." Kahless almost smiled. "To return to the ways of the warrior, we must return to a warrior's appearance." "Oh, I might as well." Q snapped his fingers. "Happy now?" Kahless reached up, felt his brow, and smiled. The smile became a deep chuckle, which gradually gave way to a deep, booming belly-laugh. "Happy indeed, old friend. I feel Klingon again!" They looked down from Sto-Vo-Kor on the pattern of fates below them, and studied the future that this new change had created. After a while, Kahless spoke again, in a matter-of-fact voice. "It is not enough." "Typical. It's never enough, is it? What more do you want me to do - bring you back to life so you can lead your people into a new golden age?" "Not yet." Kahless appeared to have ignored Q's irony again. "Maybe, in a century or so." Flicking his fingers behind his back, out of Kahless's sight, Q quickly created the seed of an idea, and planted it in the mind of a young Klingon monk several years in the future. "As if I could do something like that," he grumbled. "What do you think I am, omnipotent?" And, at last, two old friends laughed together. THE END